KEY POINTS:
John Howard's conservative Australian Government was always on borrowed time.
He snatched an extra term in government by manipulating the refugee issue based on an infamous claim of "children thrown overboard". And by arguing that Australia will decide who and under what conditions people will come to Australia.
That's always been the policy of any government. Labor fell for this line and the hysteria after 9/11 was cleverly capitalised on by Howard, who was in Washington at the time of the Twin Towers attack.
The conventional wisdom is that governments lose elections but so can opposition parties, as Australian Labor and New Zealand's National have proven.
What are the implications and lessons for New Zealand of having, for the first time in Australia's history, Labor governments in every state, territory and now Federal Government? Optimism is the opium of politics. Leaders will all read into the result what suits them.
New Zealand Labour will say the substance of the Rudd campaign - education, climate change, reconciling with indigenous people, warm relations with ethnic groups and a balanced industrial relations system - indicates a popular, progressive agenda. National will say it was time for a change and tired governments need to be replaced. Labour will be worried that even with good figures of low unemployment and record investment in health and education, people don't seem to be grateful.
National will note the skill of Rudd who defused tax cuts and other wedge issues such as Howard, late in life, discovering problems in the Aboriginal communities and sending in the police and military. Secretly hoping Labor would become incoherent with rage.
"Me, too-ing" worked. John Key will "me, too" on every issue Labour gets ahead on.
Howard promised an extra A$60 billion ($70 billion) worth of expenditure this year. Labor agreed. The Conservatives spent A$300 million in Government advertising, mirroring some of the doubtful New Zealand Government publicity campaigns.
This became the symbol of a desperate Government cynically using taxpayers' money. National will note this and should adopt Rudd's policy of independent authorisation of such expenditure.
Labor's Rudd even claimed to be more conservative than Howard on economic issues. That's the New Zealand equivalent of National's Key saying he's more feminist and green than Helen Clark. Australian Labor fielded candidates with military experience and promoted a number of ethnic candidates, and looked like modern Australia.
In New Zealand, National has a problem with the changing face of New Zealand. Take 15 per cent of New Zealanders being Maori, 10 per cent Pacific Islanders and 10 per cent Asian and migrants. Once you take out the public servants, those on benefits, or employed by the state, you are left with about 70 per cent of New Zealand voters of European extraction. Take from that a large number who support Labour because of feminist or gay issues, then National has to win 80 per cent of the vote that's left.
Very hard under MMP for them to form a Government. The Maori Party is growing, as are the Greens, and neither care if 90 per cent of New Zealanders disagree with them.
Ironically, Winston Peters and NZ First could survive as the anti-Maori Party. In a strange contradiction, the Maori and anti-Maori parties would do an easier deal with Helen Clark than National.
The next Government could have several Maori Party and Green ministers, with Winston Peters maintaining the fiction he's not in the Government, he's only Foreign Minister.
Overall, the Australian result favours NZ Labour. Helen Clark has done what Howard couldn't, she's refreshed her Cabinet with some new, loyal faces.
She's spending taxpayer money, as did Howard, to promote her Government in a ruthless, calculated way and is now moving to restrict private spending on issues that could embarrass her Government.
For some reason those who have always fought for these issues, such as the civil liberties groups, are silent. On matters of substances, trade, regional security, little will change because national interests do not really change that much with governments. What will be on the agenda in Australia will be the republic. All this is good news for New Zealand Labour.
* Mike Moore is a former Labour Prime Minister of New Zealand and director-general of the World Trade Organisation